


Girls/Girls/Boys

by softyellowlight



Category: Friday Night Dinner (TV)
Genre: Bisexual Male Character, Bisexuality, Boss/Employee Relationship, Falling In Love, Fatherhood, Las Vegas Wedding, Multi, Past Relationship(s), Praise Kink
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-07
Updated: 2020-09-07
Packaged: 2021-03-06 20:07:16
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,515
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26340880
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/softyellowlight/pseuds/softyellowlight
Summary: Okay, Jonny made bad decisions sometimes. A lot of times. But one day it would pay off. He knew it.An exploration of Jonny's on-screen relationships (Tanya, Liz, Lisa) and some that could have happened off-screen (Allison, Ben, OC Dean) leading up to Lucy at the end of season 6. Because I love Pissface with all my heart.
Relationships: Jonathan "Jonny" Goodman/Lucy (Friday Night Dinner), Jonathan "Jonny" Goodman/Original Character(s)
Comments: 2
Kudos: 12





	Girls/Girls/Boys

Okay, Jonny made bad decisions sometimes. A lot of times. Okay, he was kind of chaotic sometimes. A lot of times. Okay, he could be a bit of a prick and a smartarse and a bit stupid. He knew all this, he could admit it. But he also had feelings, god dammit. He was also sweet and generous and jumped headlong into love, like everything he did, with passion and excitement, and he didn’t think he got enough credit for any of that. So it led to awkward situations and costly mistakes sometimes. A lot of times. But one day it would pay off. He knew it. And in the mean time, he’d have plenty of fun along the way. So sue him.

***

The first girlfriend Jonny had since high school was Allison.  
He'd dated a few people for a while, hooked up with a few more, but Allison was the first longer term one. While Adam didn’t believe she existed because her schedule meant she could never make it along to a Friday night dinner, and yes, she eventually left him for his workmate Simon, she was sweet and pretty and things were easy between them. They spent countless lazy hours in Jonny’s flat or hers, mostly on the couch, binge watching boxsets and making out. Jonny always knew it wasn’t really a _serious_ relationship that would last though, which was partly why he never really bothered asking Allison to reschedule her own Friday nights to come and meet his family. It just didn’t seem worth the hassle (and getting his mum all excited) since it wouldn’t... go anywhere. But it was good for what it was. Easy, lazy. Nice. Lots of slow, late-night sex. Jonny liked to think he perfected eating girls out thanks to Allison. But all good things must come to an end, and that was alright.

***

The second girl that was more than a one night stand was Tanya Green.  
There had been something almost wild between them, something different than he’d experienced with Allison, more desperate and rough and messy. On the night his mother had invited Tanya round for dinner to try and set her up with Adam, after they’d snuck out of the house and made out against the fence until he was painfully hard, they’d gone straight back to Jonny’s and fucked frantically against just about every surface in the flat, almost as though they were trying to push each other _through_ the walls. It was surprising really, since the Goodmans and the Greens went back over twenty years, and Tanya had always seemed kind of shy and quiet when they were little. Maybe that was part of what made it so much fun. They ended up hooking up regularly for a couple of months, not really _dating_ like he had dated Allison, but it perfectly suited both of them. Too kind of casual to officially be boyfriend-girlfriend, but too kind of often not to be _something_. Whatever it was though, whatever it might have turned into, Tanya eventually moved cities for work and it was wordlessly mutually decided that there wasn’t really much point keeping in touch after that.

***

Jonny isn’t sure how he ended up with his boss, Liz.  
Well, if he thinks about it, he actually is, but he doesn’t like to. She was flirty with him, always telling him how smart he was, what a wonderful job he was doing at the real estate agency, joking about him charming or seducing clients, giving him little pats on the back and touching his arm and bringing him coffee, even though she was the boss. And although Jonny was pretty sure it was just that Liz was (how else could he put it) middle-aged and lonely, it made him feel special, as stupid as that sounded. He had low self-esteem, okay! (A lifetime of having an older brother and mental parents does that to anyone, right?) So what! And so what if every little compliment and bit of cheeky banter from Liz boosted that self-esteem until it was almost like a drug he craved and he found himself increasingly ramping up his responses to her until one day they were suddenly having sex in the agency toilets and he came when Liz called him “good boy”. The whole thing should never have happened, sure, and it definitely didn’t end well, but Jonny would be lying if he said he regretted _all_ of it.

***

The next one was a little… different. It was more meaningful, but it was also one his family didn’t know anything about and never will. There’s a possibility he might tell Adam one day, maybe, but it probably won’t be for a long time, if ever. It’s not that Jonny thinks his family won’t be understanding or supportive - it’s almost the opposite, he’s not sure he can handle how lovingly his mother might take to the knowledge that he’s bisexual, and somehow the idea of his dad pulling him aside to talk about ‘males’ is so much worse than ‘females’.

Dean was a new member of the football team Jonny casually played for and he was impossibly cool and funny and fit. At first, Jonny didn’t quite understand the overwhelming impulse he felt to try to impress Dean every time he was around. Why did it matter so much that Dean think he was a good player, think he was funny, think he was tough, successful, put-together? He was just another bloke, wasn’t he? (He wasn’t.)

The team were having drinks in a pub near the field where they played one evening (a pub _with_ atmosphere, unlike the terrible one near the family home) and everybody was buzzed and laughing and Dean was sat directly across from Jonny at the table, looking manly and gorgeous, and they’d been chatting all night.  
Jonny couldn’t stop staring at the intricate tattoos all over his perfect arms and Dean eventually noticed and asked Jonny if he had any tattoos himself and for some godforsaken reason Jonny lied and said yes, yes he did.  
“Good,” Dean replied “because I’m into tattoos... Can I see?”  
Jonny faltered for a second, trying to process if that was a come-on or just wishful thinking, and generate an excuse. “Not now, ‘cause of my shirt,” he said, indicating its buttons and long sleeves.  
“Later then,” Dean winked.  
Unfortunately Dean ended up leaving shortly after that, having to go pick his cousin up from somewhere or other, but not before sharing a funny anecdote about an ex-boyfriend that Jonny couldn’t help but picture himself in.  
“Hey Jonny, can I borrow your phone a second?” Dean asked just before he had to go.  
“Uh, sure mate,” Jonny said, handing it over, thinking Dean’s must have gone flat and he must need to call the cousin or something.  
Instead Dean typed something quickly and passed it back, his hand noticeably lingering on Jonny’s while he stood up. “My number,” he smiled. “Call me and... we can compare tattoos sometime?”

So Jonny had to get a fucking tattoo.

He didn’t know shit about tattoos, really, other than they were hot on Dean. And that one of his mates from high school, Badger, was training to be a tattooist and had a home studio of sorts set up and would do them dirt cheap, he remembered. So one afternoon Jonny went round to Badger’s place and they got absolutely _sloshed_ and when Badger eventually pulled out a few pages of flash, Jonny sort of just pointed at whatever design his wasted brain thought looked kind of badass and it happened. ‘Live fast die young’ underneath a skull that, yeah, his family were right, kind of looked like his mum. Fuck.

On Saturday, Jonny was wallowing in a bit of self-pity and pain (the tattoo _must_ have been infected or something, and Adam and his father’s constant punching and slapping of it yesterday certainly hadn't helped) when his phone rang. It was Dean.  
“Hey Jonny… I got your number from the team captain, I hope you don’t mind,” he started.  
“No! God, I mean yes! I mean, that’s fine,” Jonny said. _Embarrassing_. “I was, uh, I was meaning to call you...”  
“Really?” Dean asked, and Jonny could hear his bright smile down the line. “Awesome. Because I was wondering if you wanted to go for a drink with me tonight?”

Things had gone surprisingly well at the bar. Jonny had been uncharacteristically nervous beforehand, fiddling with his hair and changing his outfit three times and using too much of the expensive cologne his mother had gotten him for Christmas (why did they celebrate that again?) last year. He needn't have worried though. Dean was charming and funny and liked the Grand Prix and all things Formula One and football, of course, and Jonny had never really met any girls who would talk about those with him for more than a couple minutes. In fact, things went so well on the date (Jonny still couldn’t quite believe he was on a _date_ with a man – despite the fact he’d known he was attracted to men as well as women since he was a teenager it kind of just hadn’t eventuated yet) they ended up back at Dean’s place. There was brief chat on the way there of getting out the whiskey, of sorting through a box of sporting merchandise, of finding a certain race to watch on YouTube, but the reality was that as soon as they set foot in the flat, both men were far too… distracted for any of those trivialities.

As they kissed roughly, Dean pulled off Jonny’s shirt, the fabric grazing his sore new tattoo as it tugged past.  
“Ow! Fuck!” Jonny yelped instinctively.  
“Oh god! What’s happened? Are you alright?” Dean asked, then paused for moment, understanding. “Wait, is- is this brand new?” He asked, pointing at the skull with its stupid Latin phrase.  
Jonny nodded sheepishly, knowing there was no way out. This had all happened much sooner than he’d anticipated, plus the thing was being such a bitch about healing.  
“And... it’s- is it your only one?” Dean asked again, running his eyes over Jonny’s clearly blank body.  
Jonny nodded again, staring at the floor.  
Dean laughed briefly then tentatively went for the logical conclusion. “Did you... did you get this because of me?”  
There was no chance of looking cool here, Jonny groaned internally. It was over. Dean was going to think he was some massive desperate loser and it was done.  
“That is... so cute,” Dean said. “I mean, it’s fucking dumb and unnecessary, obviously, you dickhead, but it’s also maybe the cutest thing anybody has ever done? I said I liked tattoos and then you just... got one. Fuck.” Dean laughed again – gently, appreciatively – and ran his fingers ever so lightly across the inked words. “What does it mean?” he asked.  
“It means I like you,” Jonny grumbled, and then they were kissing again and Dean was pushing him onto the bed and everything got very hectic.

*******

When Jonny and Dean broke up about six months later – after six truly happy, _lovely_ months - Jonny spiralled a bit. It wasn’t necessarily obvious, not to anyone else, but it really fucking hurt. He swore they could have made it work, but after Dean tearfully told Jonny one day he’s sorry but he’s realised he’s looking for something else, he wants moving in and marriage and Jonny’s clearly not ready for that because he hasn’t even introduced Dean to his parents, and he’s sorry but Jonny’s just too immature and unstable, and he’s sorry, he loves him but they’re just not right for each other anymore, it was over. Jonny couldn’t argue with any of it – he wished he could have, he really did, but he knew deep down that he _wasn’t_ ready for… forever. The meeting parents thing alone felt impossible at the time. He still felt too young and dumb and like he still had a lot of shit to work out and, well, he was _scared._ So they had like six rounds of really fucking good break-up sex and then said goodbye.

Jonny went home and cried for two days. Then he went on a series of blinders and got on Tinder and Grindr and fucked someone different every night for a week (except Friday). He had a threesome for the first time. That was cool. And overall, he was still sad, but it was _fun._ If he was gonna be single, he thought, he was gonna really make the most if it. And maybe, as well as being fun and… filling the void, it would help him grow up a bit, get all the ‘immaturity’ out of his system and next time, he would be ready to commit…

*** 

Jonny took a bit of a break after a while, focused on getting ahead in his new real estate job, and on being a not-too-shitty son, so when the time came to go to Las Vegas for his mate’s stag a couple months later, Jonny was well and truly ready to get a) fucked up and b) fucked.

Pretty much the first girl he met in the casino was Lisa. She was American and pretty and she liked his English accent and his floppy hair and his height and, most importantly, she was down for _anything_. The next few hours (days? _weeks_? Jonny had no idea - these Vegas casinos were designed so you lost track of time and all the substances they were on definitely didn't help) blitzed by in a haze. He didn’t end up seeing much of his mates on their trip (whoops?) instead spending approximately _all the time_ having sex with Lisa. It felt so good to feel so _wanted_ again. They didn’t even know anything about each other but she didn’t seem to feel the need to. She was a no-strings dream.

“America is so mental,” he was rambling offhandedly at some point, during a brief interlude back in one of the casino’s many bars. They had to keep their fluids up, after all. “Like it’s just fucking mental here! You can buy a fucking gun in a grocery store, you can set fireworks off whenever you want, you can get like fifteen thousand types of fast food and it’s all bigger than your head..."  
Lisa laughed. “Yeah! You can get married by Elvis, you can-"  
“Oh my god! Yes! I’ve heard about that!” Jonny carried on. “Fucking hilarious! So _American!_ We should do that!” He cackled.  
“We should!” Lisa joined in, downing the last of her umpteenth cocktail and climbing into his lap.  
“Married by Elvis! What a fucking laugh!” Jonny couldn’t stop himself now. “We really should! Fuck. Lisa. Marry me?”  
“Hell yeah!” she cheered, pulling him in for a kiss. “And we should dress like cowboys!" she added when they broke apart. "Cowboy hats are so cute!"  
"Why the fuck not!" Jonny agreed, then they were up and practically running to the chapel and it was all done in barely the blink of an eye. _Mazel tov!_

Lisa was so excited about visiting England that Jonny couldn’t help but run with it. Maybe they _could_ make it work, he thought on the plane ride home, maybe it wasn't _totally_ insane... Thousands of people have, like, arranged marriages all the time and stay together, this couldn’t be any harder than that? Lisa was cute, she was kind, she was good in bed, and she was American which was good for Visa prospects and stuff. She was from California (well, probably, he couldn’t remember actually) and it was hot and sunny there, which would make for an excellent change from England! The more he thought about it, the more his muddled head started to think it made sense. Of course, in the cold light of the English day (or rather, night, as Jonny brought his new wife home to his gobsmacked family) it just didn’t pan out. But there were no hard feelings… and what a story!

***

Ben was a weird one. Jonny knew that. But after Ben went home in a taxi from the disastrous family dinner Jonny had invited him to, laughing hysterically at the melted face of Martin's horrible ventriloquist doll Lord Luck, Jonny couldn't help but think there _had_ to be a better way to cheer him up. And then he couldn't help but think that maybe the whole 'cheering Ben up' business was more about himself, because when Ben wasn't miserable, he was clever and quirky and Jonny kept catching himself thinking about how Ben's beard would feel against his skin. Either way, Jonny had a feeling that Ben, although he was pretty sure he was pretty straight, wouldn't be averse to the idea of him as some kind of rebound thing, at least. They were good friends, after all, and why couldn’t friends suck each other’s dicks? So, they did that. And other things. And it ended up going on for quite a while until Ben met another girl he really liked and more or less decided he didn’t need Jonny anymore. And if it stung a little when they had to stop, and if Jonny continued to picture Ben, his doe eyes and his low moans, sometimes when he touched himself after that, well, it would never be admitted.

***

Lucy is a miracle. She’s a ray of pure sunshine. Jonny can’t quite believe someone like her a) exists and b) loves _him._ She’s an angel! With killer hair! And style! And sense of humour! Not to mention she has a good job and a nice flat and is a great cook and good at sports and fixing things and picking movies. Plus! She’s bisexual too! She gets it, gets everything. And he knows it’s cliché but she really brings out the best in him. She makes him believe that he, too, can be smart and kind and _good._ More than what he is. The ‘better half’ phrase finally makes sense to Jonny now. The one and only downside he can think of is that she has the same name as Adam’s girlfriend, but in a way even that’s kind of endearing as well. It certainly entertains his parents. And Lucy is so relaxed and happy to take the world as it comes or as occasion calls – crossing bridges when they get to them, or building them, or burning them… She’s everything to him. And he never thought he’d feel that way.

So after almost a year together, when Adam woefully suggests ‘it’s time’ – the Lucys are coming to Friday night dinner, whether any of the four of them are ready yet or not – Jonny feels a strange, exciting cocktail of emotions. Although he still totally dreads the over-the-top parental reaction he knows is inevitable, and jokingly tells Lucy he’s going to wear a pool floatie in readiness for his mother flooding the house with happy tears, he is proud. Proud of himself, proud of Adam, and of their being able to show the world that even grown men who call each other Pissface and Pusface, can succeed. Because Lucy is success. She’s a victory. And he did that - he did something right. He met her and asked her out and became her boyfriend and her best friend, and he thinks one day he’s going to be her husband too... If (and it’s a big if) they can get through dinner!

The pregnancy is… well, it’s a big surprise. Fucking huge. He can’t deny that when Lucy first confessed it, he was in proper shock. Partly because he’d found out only moments before that Adam’s Lucy was pregnant and he was going to be an uncle and that was massive but it made sense – Pusface was older and had always liked kids and had talked about having them sooner rather than later. But the news that he – Jonny! Jonathan Goodman! Pissface! – was going to be a _dad_ too was almost system overload, like his circuitry just overheated and he stopped functioning altogether for a minute. But when it sunk in, he realised that he was happy. He was so fucking happy! He was almost baffled by that revelation – like he felt he _ought_ to be frightened or stressed or angry instead, but he _wasn’t._ He looked in Lucy’s gorgeous eyes and down at her gorgeous stomach with a tiny, tiny baby inside ( _his_ tiny, tiny baby!) and up again at her gorgeous smile and down again at her stomach (his _child!_ ) and up again at her eyes and he felt like nothing could ever be wrong in the world again. He felt like he had purpose. Like he was part of something bigger – something that really mattered, perhaps for the first time ever. All his mistakes had finally paid off. And it was going to be hard, undoubtedly, probably the hardest thing ever (oh god, was being a father what had turned his own father into the absolute nutcase he was today?!) but he couldn’t wait.

**Author's Note:**

> This is obviously a bit of a wild mixture between canon and my imagination so thank you for bearing with me!  
> In case you're wondering - Allison is mentioned through season 1, Tanya appears in S1E6, Liz appears in S2E4, Jonny has the tattoo in S3E4, Lisa is in S4E3, Ben is in S5E4, and Lucy (played by the delightful Pearl Mackie) is mentioned through season 6 before appearing S6E6. Pearl Mackie's real life bisexuality inspired this a little bit.
> 
> Title from the song by Panic! at the Disco.
> 
> I plan to write more about Jonny and Adam as new fathers soon because I can't stop thinking about it :')


End file.
